


Walking on a Wire

by alessandralee



Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Future Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-10
Updated: 2015-09-10
Packaged: 2018-04-20 02:45:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4770575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alessandralee/pseuds/alessandralee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the night before everyone leaves for college, and Lucas has terrible timing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Walking on a Wire

“You’re coming over in the morning?” Lucas listens as Maya asks.

“Of course,” Riley tells her. “I’m going to be the last person you see before you fly away. Well me, and you Mom and Shawn.”

The two girls hug, and Lucas lingers by the door, waiting for them to remember he’s still there.

It’s like any other night hanging out at the Matthews, except that it was their last night doing it. Tomorrow, they’d all scatter across the globe for college.

It had been the big weight hanging over them all night, as they gorged themselves on pizza and pastries from Topanga’s. Riley and Farkle had cried, Zay had been more somber than usual, and even Maya has been without her usual spark.

Farkle’s parents are driving him up to MIT for orientation. He’s also leaving, to start the long drive to Ohio, where he’d been accepted to a pre-vet program. Riley still has a few days before she can move into her dorms at Yale, and Zay had decided to stay into New York for school, so he could take his time moving.

Maya has surprised them all when she announced she’d be leaving the country for art school. Everyone has just assumed she’s stay close to home. But instead she’d packed two suitcases until they were bursting at the seems, figuring that if she was going to go into debt paying for college, at least she’d rack it up in an exciting city like London.

So tomorrow morning she’s catching a plane out of JFK. Unlike the rest of them, she wouldn’t be home for Thanksgiving, but she’d already booked her flight home to Christmas, so to reassure Riley that she would come.

“I’ll walk you home,” Lucas offers when the two girls pull apart, tears shining in their eyes. It’s been like that for days.

Maya fishes a small spray-can on mace out of her bag, holding it up as a reminder that she could walk alone at night without his protection.

“Humor me,” he tells her. “I’m not going to see you for four months and I’m feeling sentimental.”

Maya rolls her eyes at him, but after she waves goodbye to Riley, she tugs him out the door by his shirt.

“You nervous?” he asks, as they step out of Riley’s building and onto the sidewalk.

It’s hot and muggy out, even with the sundown. Farkle and Zay must have decided it wasn’t worth waiting for them, not that Lucas blames them.

Maya laughs at him, “We’re not having a deep conversation about our fears for the next chapter of our lives. Nice try.”

“So that’s a yes, then?” he replies.

Maya’s preferred method of dealing with things that bother her is to pretend they don’t exist. It’s totally unhealthy, and they’ve all spent years trying to break her of the habit, with some success. But it doesn’t surprise him that she’s fallen back into it.

“I’m not worried about moving to a new place or making new friends,” she insists. “I don’t need new friends.”

Lucas doesn’t say anything. He’s learned that Maya doesn’t like silence, and when she’s faced with it, she’ll admit to a lot just to fill it.

“It’s just… what if I come back in December and my friends don’t need me?” she mumbles, so quiet he has to piece together the words he misses. Then louder, “I mean Riley’s already making friends, and she’s not even in New Haven yet. Did you know she made a pros and cons list for four different sororities?”

He’d seen the lists, he just hadn’t know what they were for. It doesn’t surprise him, though.

“And you think any of them can compare to you?” Lucas says.

“When I’m on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? Absolutely,” Maya stares straight ahead as she says it.

“Not possible,” Lucas says firmly. “You two are stuck with each other. Different countries and time zones isn’t going to change anything.”

“You really think so?” she asks quietly.

“Yes,” he says. “You and Riley, and Farkle, Zay and me. You’ll never escape.”

Maya’s quiet for a moment, then she says, “Whatever.”

And that’s the end of that that conversation. Lucas just hopes he got through to her at least a little bit. Maya doesn’t open up to him very often.

They stop at a corner to wait for a trickle of cars to pass and Maya asks, “What about you, Huckleberry? What are you freaking out about?”

He winces at the nickname. She doesn’t use them very much these days, but she must be feeling sentimental tonight, too.

“Not much,” he admits. “I’m worried that the classes will be too hard, or that my roommate will be one of those guys who parties every night and keeps me up.”

The latter has a good chance of being true. He’s seen the guy’s Facebook page; he’s holding a beer in almost every photo.

“He might actually make you interesting, then,” she teases.

“Like you made me boring?”

Maya rewards him with a quick laugh. It’s a sharpest reminder of his biggest worry.

The one where he goes off to college, meets new people, new girls. And despite the distance, and the new life he’s enjoying, he comes home at Christmas with same hopeless crush he has now.

The one he spent the last three years hiding, and the year before that denying even existed.

Because having a crush on your ex’s (Ex-crush? Ex-girlfriend? Ex-weird mutual pining that never really amounted to anything?) best friend kind of sucks.

Especially when that best friend is as loyal as Maya Hart.

Because she’s certainly never going to do anything that hurts Riley.

So Lucas has kept his feelings to himself, dated other girls, then broken up with those other girls when he realized he wasn’t being fair to them.

And he just can’t continue to be stuck in this situation.

He listens as Maya teases him about moving to the middle of nowhere for school, then lists all the things that actually excite her about moving to London (free museums, new art classes, still not needed to learn to drive).

He’s going to miss her. He’s going to miss everyone, but Maya most of all.

They stop at the end of her block, the light left on in her living room visible from where they’re standing.

“So I guess this is it,” Maya says awkwardly.

“Yeah,” he agrees.

“Have fun in Ohio,” she tells him, although her tone suggests she doesn’t think that’s possible.

“I’ll try,” he sys. “Try not forget about me when you’re off in the big city.” He uses his thickest cowboy accent.

Maya wraps her arms around him in a hug that lingers just a little too long. It’s a hug that convinces him, why not? This is the last time they’ll see each other for months.

He leans down and kisses her.

It’s brief, his common sense returning to him seconds after his lips press up against hers. He pulls away quickly.

But not so quickly that he doesn’t realize she kissed him back.

There’s a pause and then Maya glares up at him, “Seriously?”

He doesn’t know what to say. But that’s fine because Maya can think of plenty.

“All you had to do was wait one day,” she looks at her phone. “Make that ten hours. I’d have been in another country and all this,” she gestures between the two of them, “would have died down.”

“Would it have?” he asks, even less sure after that kiss.

A kiss he’d like to repeat.

That would probably end violently.

“It has to,” she insists. “You’re Riley’s.”

But he isn’t. He hasn’t been for years. He knows better than to say that to Maya, though. So he keeps quiet. He’s gotten pretty good at that, when it comes to her.

“Ten hours and things would have stayed normal,” she hisses, finally realizing she doesn’t want to be that person making a scene in public. “And you ruined it.”

It’s probably bad that he’s enjoying this, watching her get so worked up. Over him. Over his feelings, which she reciprocates.

He considers kissing her again, but that might get him slapped.

Instead he says, “Are you done yet?”

Maya lets out a frustrated sigh, “For now.” Then pointedly, “But we’re talking about this when I come home for Christmas.”

She storms off down the block, fumbling briefly with her keys at the entrance to her building. He waits until she’s safely inside.

Then he begins his own walk home, suddenly looking forward to Christmas.


End file.
